Welcome to our consultation website for a new padel club here in Buckhurst Hill.
Buckhurst Hill Padel Club Ltd are proposing a community padel club on land at Bancroft Rugby Football Club. We are delighted to share our plans in advance of a formal planning application.
All of our project information and consultation materials can be found here on our website, where you can learn more about the project team, understand our vision for the site and how you can provide feedback to the project team.
This website will be kept updated, allowing you to review the proposals as they develop.
About Us
Bancroft Rugby Football Club has been part of the community in Buckhurst Hill for almost sixty years. Tracing its origins back to the 1890s, the Club moved to its current grounds in 1968.
Through the decades, the Club has continued to improve its facilities, to make sure that it provides one of the best sporting venues in the area.
From the introduction of squash courts in the 1970s, to renovating the grounds in 1980s, the Club have looked to continuously diversify the sporting offer available for local families.
Following an approach from a local group, the Buckhurst Hill Padel Club company was formed to work with the Club, to improve the sporting offer across the grounds with the delivery of a brand new padel facility alongside the rugby football club.
This new use will widen the recreational offer to local residents and provide one of the best local sporting venues in the area for future generations.
Our Plans
Our proposals seek to safeguard the continued presence of Bancroft Rugby Football Club in Buckhurst Hill, while maximising the potential of underused areas of the grounds so that we can offer leading recreational facilities for local families for another next 60 years – and beyond.
Our future plans for the site will ensure that there is no reduction in the existing rugby capacity on the site, while continuing to provide leading recreational services and supporting the long term maintenance and renovations of the pitches, equipment and clubhouse building.
Backed by both the Rugby Football Union (RFU) and English Lawn Tennis Association (LTA), our proposals will provide the following investments for the community:
Relocating the training pitch alongside the existing match pitches, to make the northern playing fields the dedicate grounds for Bancroft Rugby Football Club.
Upgrade of the Club’s existing 75 space car park so it is fit for purpose including accessible bays, along with a further 25 spaces for padel users.
Create a new and separate Padel Clubhouse – whilst the padel facilities will be an integral part of the Bancroft leisure site, we are looking to create a small, dedicated clubhouse providing toilets and changing facilities, along with its own kitchen, seating and fitness area.
Seven new padel courts, including four fully open and three semi-covered courts.
Landscaping, upgrades to pathways, retention of trees and new planting across the grounds.
Sensitively designed to be obscured from neighbouring homes by existing buildings and trees.
Benefits to the Existing Club
Allow the club to invest in up-to-date equipment and facilities.
Continue to support the operations of the club.
Help keep membership fees competitive.
Provide an improved sporting offer, all year through, for the local community in Buckhurst Hill.
Our Vision
Our vision is to establish a welcoming, inclusive and community-focused padel club in Buckhurst Hill that promotes health, wellbeing, social connection and active lifestyles for residents of all ages and abilities.
Our Priorities
Provide a community padel club with access to other sports within the Rugby Club.
Develop junior sport through a schools programme.
Welcome family members.
Provide access and encourage disabled padel.
Maintain a high-quality facility.
School Partnerships
We are advancing conversations with a number of local schools to provide access to our facilities across the Club, at set times and days during the week.
The aim of this partnership is to increase participation in sport among young people while introducing an accessible and engaging activity that supports physical and social development. Our initiatives include:
Curriculum sports partnerships
After-school clubs
School tournaments
Access to facilities during off-peak hours
Free of charge coaching support for PE programmes
Youth mentoring and volunteering opportunities
The Club are already actively engaging with local schools in the local Buckhurst Hill area, with Buckhurst Hill Community Junior School already on board for term time play and coaching.
We continue our conversations with Woodbridge High School and the Bancroft family of Schools.
If there are any other local schools that would be interested in discussing padel as part of their sporting curriculum, then please feel free to share this with a member of the project team or as part of your feedback on our proposals.
Our Supporters
Feedback
The consultation for padel tennis at Bancroft Rugby Football Club ran from Wednesday 15 July until Wednesday 5 August 2026. We would like to thank everyone who engaged with our consultation and provided feedback on our proposals.
Feedback from this consultation, along with our ongoing technical work, will inform the planning application we submit to Redbridge Council.
As part of the application, we will submit a Statement of Community Involvement (SCI), which will summarise comments received from the local community and detail the engagement activities undertaken in support of the project.
Redbridge Council will conduct its own consultation before making a decision on the application. This presents another opportunity to provide feedback on our application.
If you have any questions regarding the proposals, then you can get in touch with the project team through the links on the Contact Us section.
Timeline
Contact Us
If you have any questions regarding the proposals, then you can get in touch with the project team by emailing your answers to the project team at info@BuckhurstHillPadelClub-Consultation.com
Or you can post your comments (no stamp required) to: FREEPOST PLUS RUHR-ZXEU-TASK, 7 St Cross Street, London, EC1N 8UB